Friday, January 21, 2011

Sometimes I think Mother Nature is a sweet natured old lady baking pies, yet other times I think she's a cranky old bitchy cat lady. Yesterday it was the latter. Despite every weatherman in Nashville and many frantic texts from friends trying to deter me from venturing out in the slush, I was on a mission...a mission to go see Cake at the Ryman. [Tangent: My brother Mikey gave me tickets to Cake for Christmas based possibly solely on the fact that Never There is my ringback tone, and he knows that my love of 90s music, and live 90s music at that, is great. He's very good at context clues.] I knew that it may not be the best idea to be the driver given that I have very little experience with snow driving under my belt, and the term black ice was being tossed around like a water balloon. However, I have a very powerful sense of misguided security; I felt the brown beast and I were ready to tango with Mother Nature.

Despite driving for about 8 miles with a fogged up windshield, losing control of the car, not being able to see the lane demarkations and possibly shaving a year or two off my copilot's life- the ride went well and I got myself and my two friends to the show and home in tact. [Tangent: Maybe in my head I was singing my favorite Cake song (and in general, my favorite song about the devil and automotives), which incidentally they didn't play in concert, but I will share with you below.]

From beginning to end the Cake show was everything I had dreamed: oddly fantastic. I will even go out on a shaky branch and say that the lead singer, John McCrea, is a powerful breed of sexy. [Tangent: Amid my concert going posse, composed of Beth and Alicia, I was definitely alone in thinking this. They agreed with me that his voice is ridiculously hot, but I was onboard for the whole enchilada. Any assholey fella with a false sense of self importance, who can break a crowd into a boys vs. girls lyrical shouting match like a middle school pep rally, is cool peeps in my book. Also, at some point, he gave away a sapling to the person who could correctly identify that it was a buckeye tree. Who doesn't love a botany enthusiast?] Amid his ramblings and showmanship, I have become fascinated with a new instrument that I'm sure I could rock the stuffing out of...the vibraslap.

meow. I love a man in Mickey Mouse gloves (and yes he wore those at the Ryman for two songs before melodramatically tossing them into the front row.).

As with most shows I have been to, the best entertainment is usually in the audience, and Cake did not disappoint. Luckily, a mixed crowd is my favorite kind. No matter the concert, there is always a couple people that appear to not know what they are about to see as if they were given tickets on the street. These people were in front of us. One gentleman, whose go-to move was the air hump, was in his mid 60s and looked slightly perplexed by the goings on onstage. Alicia hypothesized that maybe he was a baker and was thinking a literal Cake show was being held at the Ryman.

Another group in the pew in front of us seemed to be auditioning for Pretty Woman 2 (straight to DVD). In other words- I think these two gentleman brought a 'tute to a Cake show. I could be way off, but the lady was wearing a micro mini, white girl cornrows and thigh high patent boots- all the makings of a lady of the night. [Tangent: I'd like to take this opportunity to reiterate that it was snowing outside.] She also may or may not have rubbed up on security and had her butt played like a bongo drum at some point in the show, which leads me to think my speculation is correct.

Ok. That's all for now...Go dig out your old Cake CD...I have a vibraslap to purchase.

I'll leave you with my other potential blog titles:

Cake is better with Frosting [terrible pun of the night, care of Beth.]

2 comments:

Second, I totally had a blast singing and dancing and poking fun at the crazies all night.

I think my problem with the lead singer is that I'm a John Mayer fan, so I already have a self-important, super talented, addictive to listen to, and-let's-not-forget-good-looking man in my life. The boat would be rocked with another thrown in.